🚀 go-pugleaf

Justin Liew wrote:
> 
> List your 5 favorite games, and reasons why they are your favorites.

Twinsen's Odyssey.
Civ2.
MOO2.
Dungeon (Zork).
Alpha Centauri.
 
> Describe each game in one sentence.

TO:  cute, beautiful, and long.
Civ2:  study to rule the world.
MOO2:  work to rule the galaxy.
Dungeon:  solve wacky puzzles.
AC:  study to rule another world.
 
> What factors do you think make games so popular?
> ie. What factors would persuade you to buy a certain game?

Surprise, mental challenge, beauty.
 
> Would you let your children play your 5 favorite games?  Why or why not?

If i had children, yes, once they showed aptitude and interest,
although that one angry outburst by Twinsen does concern me.

> How does the perception of the impact of violence in games differ from
> that in other mediums? (ie. TV, movies, music).

My perception?  Only in that in games you may be the active and decisive
perpetrator of some violence.
 
> Do you think violence in computer games affects children/teenagers, and
> to what extent?

Yes, from my own experience, at least some children find depicted
violence,
both verbal and physical, very disturbing.

Moreover, children imitate.  It's their primary mechanism for learning.

The same applies to TV and radio.  For example, when i was a child, i
used
to watch reruns of The Three Stooges.  These immediately made me very
aggressive.
 
> Do you think violence in computer games affects adults, and to what
> extent?

That would depend on their frame of mind.  When i'm already frustrated
by events at work or socially, then play an action or conquest game, i
take a lot of its violence onboard, and amplify it by venting my pent-up
anger.  This causes me to make mistakes, so i can come away from the
game
feeling even angrier than when i started it.  Next time i face the cause
of my real-life frustration, i am sometimes still in the game's "quash
the enemy" mode.  That's bad.
 
> Any other comments.

Yes, don't believe anyone who says that media have no influence
on how people feel.  The media exist to affect how people feel,
and to profit by that influence.

> Thank you for your time,
> Justin Liew (please respond via email, and remove NOSPAM)

-- 
Best wishes!
Geoffrey Tobin
Email:  G.T...@latrobe.edu.au
WWW:    http://www.ee.latrobe.edu.au/~gt/gt.html